The Red and the Black
Stendhal1830Stendhal more or less invented the modern psychological novel here, a book driven by what a character thinks and wants instead of what happens to him.
Read this if you…
- want the first awesome psychological novel (you're in his head)
- love some love interests that are messy
- love an ambitious social climber as a protagonist
Skip this if you…
- have an instinctual aversion to anything French
The 
Take
Thought it was great, awesome depiction of the ambitious sorel with his 2 love interests. Liked the ending too, loved the abrupt climax , no ruminating. The push and pull throughout the book was great
The lineage through The Red and the Black
- Confessions by Jean-Jacques Rousseau. The Red and the Black built on it. - To understand Julien Sorel, read the book Julien reads: Rousseau's *Confessions* is the one volume that shapes his imagination, his pride, even his love affair - Stendhal names it outright — Julien's "horror of eating with the servants" is lifted from Rousseau, his entire sense of wounded merit borrowed from it - *The Red and the Black* is in part a study of what the *Confessions* did to the young men who took it as scripture
Depicted in Art
Julien Sorel observes Madame de Rênal and Élisa the chambermaid in the moment the chambermaid discovers their affair.
Henri-Joseph Dubouchet, 1884
Etched plate from the 1884 Conquet illustrated edition depicting a scene from the novel.
Henri-Joseph Dubouchet, 1884
Etched plate from the 1884 Conquet illustrated edition depicting a scene from the novel.
Henri-Joseph Dubouchet, 1884
Title page from the 1831 Levavasseur edition of Stendhal's novel, second volume.
1831
Etched plate from the 1884 Conquet illustrated edition depicting a scene from the novel.
Henri-Joseph Dubouchet, 1884
Recommended Editions
Burton Raffel
Modern Library · 2004
Raffel's English is plain and quick, which fits Stendhal's flat ironic narrator. The Modern Library intro is good on the airless post-Napoleonic France Julien is trying to climb.
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Notable Quotes
A novel is a mirror carried along a high road.
Screen & Stage
Posters via The Movie Database (TMDB)
- John F. Kennedy, 35th U.S. President, 1917–1963: Listed The Red and the Black among his particular favorites — the books that had shaped him.
- Friedrich Nietzsche, German philosopher, 1844–1900: Hailed Stendhal as the last great psychologist — the model of the dry, clear, illusionless mind a good philosopher needs.
- Honoré de Balzac, French novelist, 1799–1850: Was among the writers who grasped the novel's significance from the start.
- Leo Tolstoy, Russian novelist, 1828–1910: "I am, more than anyone else, indebted to Stendhal. He taught me to understand war."
- Ernest Hemingway, American novelist, Nobel laureate, 1899–1961: Put The Red and the Black on his short list of essential novels for young writers.
- Al Gore, Former U.S. Vice President, Nobel Peace laureate, b. 1948: Named The Red and the Black his favorite novel.